1825 – Understanding the Operational Culture with Miriam Dicks

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2:09With us right now, it's Miriam Dix. Miriam, you are an operations strategist, and you are the founder and CEO of 180 Management Group. Your website is 180managementgroup.com. Miriam, thank you so much for joining us. Hi, Josh. Thank you so much for having me. Well, I'm excited to learn about what you do, who you serve, and the kind of the impact you have in the world. Well, awesome. So I am an operations strategist, as we talked about. What we do at 180 Management Group is that we provide operations consulting, management consulting, specifically in operations for mainly a lot of nonprofit organizations.

2:47What we find is that in that particular space, there are many people who are led by their heart and really want to do a great work in the world. But when it comes to the structure and the systems and support that's needed to carry out that work, it's sometimes lacking. So we go in and we help those folks to build the systems that they need so that they can implement their mission and vision according to a strategy for their operations. Boy, I've got some introductions for you afterwards. We need to talk. Miriam, tell me maybe some observations of working specifically in the nonprofit world. Do you see anything that maybe might be unique or trends that you'll see kind of more in that non-profits world that may be a little bit different than the for-profit world when it comes to operational success, you know, that sort of thing?

3:36So my background actually is in the corporate space. Oh, okay. So I worked as a consultant in the corporate space for corporate America in the healthcare industry. And I will say that when I started working with nonprofits, there was sort of this culture shock, if you will, because many times in the nonprofit space, again, we're talking about folks who are leading with their heart. They are trying to fill a void within society that's not being filled by our governments, not being filled by the private industry. And so when it comes to the work that's being done, it's so passion-led that sometimes we're looking at, okay, does this make good business sense, right?

4:13We have a service we want to provide, but does it make good business sense? And then it really leads to some cultural nuances when it comes to how it is that we relate to one another, because we don't necessarily see a nonprofit as a business. We see it as a nonprofit organization. And so we have to constantly say, well, it doesn't mean you don't need to generate revenue and be sustainable, even though you're not filing taxes on the extra that you have. You're reinvesting it into the organization. And so that mindset is often sort of a blinder, if you will, when it comes to how do we have an efficient business practice, not just a great service.

4:55And so that's probably the bigger challenge in working with the nonprofit organizations that we work with. However, it's not something that can't be overcome. And let me say this, there's some really, really smart people in the nonprofit sector. I'm not saying that at all. There are some outright geniuses in those organizations, but the culture that exists, our behaviors, our practices, our beliefs, right? That's what encapsulates our culture within an organization. Those are the things that we run up against. We want to be a family. We want to make sure everyone's happy. We want to make sure that everyone feels that their voice is heard.

5:30And those kinds of cultural nuances, I think, separate that industry out from others. Yeah. So Miriam, tell me about what your engagement typically looks like. So you're working with a client, kind of where do you start and where do you see yourself going together generally? So typically we start an engagement with an assessment. Operations doesn't happen in a vacuum. So you could go in and say, oh, I want you to help in this one specific area. But because your operations are sort of wired throughout the organization, it's hard to pinpoint one specific area and say, oh, this is the problem. So what we like to do is do an assessment of the organization.

6:08And when we assess the organization, we're assessing something very specific, what we call operational culture. So we're looking at three components. We're looking at how people work together, right? And that's part of your org chart and your job descriptions and things like that. We're also looking at how work is done. That's process, policy, procedure. And then we're also looking at how work informs strategy. So what reports are you able to form or produce that's going to inform your strategy or strategic plan and how it is that you can better your organization? So we go in and we look for those three components.

6:42We do an assessment and that gives us an idea of where they may be struggling to be efficient. You know, is it that we don't work well together as a team? Is it that we don't really have a process for who's on first? It's almost like a nonchalant, you know, whatever comes up, someone works on it and it's done and we don't really have a way of tracking it or we don't have a way of monitoring whether it got done well. And so the problems can resurface again. So we're looking at all these different cultural nuances that impact operations. And from there, we can give a great strategy as to how we can move the organization forward.

7:20But without that assessment, we're kind of shooting in the dark. And what I like to say is you don't want to go to the doctor and they give you medicine without doing an exam.

7:29you want the doctor at least some vitals, right? You know, check my blood pressure, check my temperature, you know, ask me some questions about my cough or my scenes or how it was I was feeling last night. Ask me those questions and then give me some solutions. And so as a consultant, you know, in my previous life, I know that many consultants have come into organizations, provided a great plan and a strategy. And because the culture did not support that strategy, guess what happened to that plan? It was on the shelf. never got implemented or maybe somewhat implemented. And now you've paid for something that still didn't give you what you wanted.

8:06So - You know, I'm on your website and I like this question. I'd love to have you kind of comment on some of these symptoms that, to our friend that's listening, if any of this sounds familiar, they may want to grab a conversation with you really quick. So, again, it's your organization growth both outpacing your operations. So here's some symptoms of how this might look. Leaders are spending more time managing problems than really doing what they should be doing. Again, maximizing potential and growing, growing, growing, kind of being on that side of it. Or staff's doing work, work, work, work, work, but the gains are just not there.

8:46Your team's got more projects than processes. Or again, you're just limited by your structure. You feel incredibly understaffed that You might feel that way. And it's like, there's so many opportunities or things we should be doing. We just can't get to everything. Well, the answer to that, Miriam, is better processes and systems and, you know, just being way more smart and tactical about how we do things. Yes, exactly. And, you know, even at, I will say this, I was having a conversation yesterday with another consultant. And one of the things we talked about, even as consultants, is how is it that, you know, we recognize when we need to have a change in our own processes and systems.

9:26So for example, she'd hired someone to work on contracts, contracted services, and that person didn't have the same skillset as she did as a consultant, but great administrator. And so then it becomes, well, is that role too big? If every time that something goes on, you have to go in and supervise, Right. Maybe the role needs to be shaped differently so that someone with great administrative skills has an administrative role. And if you need to have that strategy piece within that particular project that you have someone separate that handles strategy. Sometimes it's about the right sizing of your jobs.

10:04Sometimes it's about the actual matching of the work to the strategy. right because those mismatches are what tend to create some of those symptoms that you were mentioning like one is turnover people don't feel as though they can be successful because the job is not right size right fit some of it is the stress that's you know associated with not knowing who's on first because everyone's doing their own thing the stress of not understanding if you're in compliance because we haven't really evaluated our risk and we don't have systems in place for our risk management. So all those things can really, all those symptoms can really add up over time and create in a work environment that may not be really productive.

10:55Yeah. Miriam, you recently wrote an article, by the way, a pretty good LinkedIn follow. I was kind of going through some of the content you're sharing, but this idea, and I wonder how often this comes up too about organizations that kind of get just get stuck in the old way of doing things. And so I think right now we're seeing such a boom in new tools and technology, specifically AI, and that can be, might be scary to some organizations. And you wrote an article about, you know, three strategies for introducing new technology in your nonprofit, which likely, you know, there may be some opportunities there.

11:31If you've been doing things the old way for quite some time and you haven't evaluated, you know, new tools or new technology that's available. And these new tools and technology can completely revolutionize, you know, what you're able to do and the impact you're able to have in the world. But would you talk maybe just about that topic of, you know, because sometimes you're going to encounter some resistance. People don't want to do things differently if they've, they're used to doing it the old way, but I'm sure you've seen some stuff. You know, I liken it to if you were to go into a cell phone store, I won't name any, but if you went, you wanted a new cell phone because the one you have is still flip phone.

12:12If you're out there and you have that, I'm sorry, I'm not picking on you, but just making an example. So you have this flip phone and you want to go and you want to upgrade your flip phone. Well, when you get to the store, typically you're going to have so many different options that you might feel overwhelmed, but you're gonna have someone talk you through the options and then you're gonna land on one that you feel is the best option for you. But this is the kicker. When you get home, all those things that they said about this phone that you could do, you probably forgot them already. And so now you've bought this nice technology, this new upgraded phone, and it does all these wonderful things.

12:49And the best thing you can do with it is make a phone call because it's new and you don't understand it. So when it comes to adopting new technology in an organization, you want to be able to, one, make an informed decision about the technology that you're using. Two, make sure that there is some support and training for this technology. And three, make sure that it is communicated throughout the organization. Now, the article you're reading may have that in a different format because I've written a couple of things. Those are basic pieces of it. If you're going to adopt new technology, make sure you've done your research.

13:24Make sure you've done your homework. Make sure you understand how your organization typically adopts new technology. If you've had failed initiatives in the past, you want to go back and say, why did it fail? Because just adding another piece of technology on top of failed technology is just more expensive bad technology. So you want to have those conversations in-house about what it is that we need, do the research, understand what it is. But then the training piece is going to be a really key part of the adoption. because many times we'll go in, this is another example. I worked for the hospital systems back when they were doing EMR, electronic medical records implementation.

14:02So we went from paper records to electronic medical records. And we also needed to match our electronic medical records to electronic billing practices because now they were all housed in one system. Well, the organization decided that they were going to get this new shiny billing system, but they didn't get the big package that came with all the training and support. They decided that their staff would be great at training and support. So now you have this new technology with limited support when it came to the implementation of it. And that put a lot of pressure on the people within the organization to figure it out.

14:40Don't skimp on the support. Yeah. If you're going to adopt new technology enterprise-wide, do not skimp on the support and the implementation of it. Because what you'll find - Can you imagine what a nightmare that could be? How disruptive that would be operationally if, again, folks are given tool, cool, but nobody knows what they're doing. That could really have consequences. So that's part of that execution rollout is make sure we have a plan for success. So I could get in the weeds on that a little bit, but I wanna make sure and share your website. It's 180managementgroup.com. And Miriam, when somebody goes there, what would you recommend they do?

15:20Like, how do they kind of take the next step after listening to our conversation? Sure. So there is a little button, top right corner, I believe it is, that says schedule a call. If you want to, you know, talk to us about operations consulting, you can do that. If you want to talk to us about speaking and training, facilitating, we can do that as well. If you want to talk to us about leadership coaching and consulting, we can also do that. But all you have to do is go to our website, you click on schedule a call, and that will take you to a Calendly link. You can schedule at your convenience and have an initial consultation free of charge.

15:54We just talk to you about what it is you want to learn more about and figure out what the path forward should be. But yeah, simple. We try to make it as simple as we possibly can to reach out to us. Miriam Dix, again, you're an operations strategist and you're the founder and CEO of 180 Management Group. Your website is 180managementgroup.com. Miriam, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me.

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